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“Let Us Sing as We Go”: Language Origins and the Sung Response of Faith
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 May 2017
Abstract
Theological and evolutionary anthropological analysis of the role of song in human and (some) animal communication can help to expand our understanding of the ways that language functions as mediator of the divine-human relationship. This article considers the role of a musical protolanguage in the evolution of human language, demonstrating the connections between contemporary human language and the songs or calls of other animals. Consideration of the broader category of communication in the place traditionally held by a more narrow understanding of language can help to highlight the role that emotion, instinct, and relationality play in the relationship that humans have with God. Such a realization opens the doors to further theological questions about the role of humanity in a suffering creation, the relationship between God and nonhuman creatures, and the role of song in liturgical celebration.
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References
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9 Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 126–33.
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17 Ibid., 517–18. Here Chauvet cites Gregory of Nazianzus’ Dogmatic Poems.
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20 Ibid.
21 Ibid., 554.
22 Ibid.
23 Ibid.
24 Ibid.
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31 While the original function may have been as an alarm call, and given the loud level of the duet, it clearly seems to continue to serve a public social function in demarcating an area, the current function seems to have shifted toward the fostering of the social pair bond. These two functions are closely related; Geissmann suggests that a more practiced duet signals the thorough establishment of the pair bond, thus discouraging intruders who might seek to take advantage of a new couple whose unpracticed duet signals their vulnerability. Geissmann, “Gibbon Songs and Human Music,” 119.
32 Tomasello also observes that individual primates will continue the “danger” or “food” vocalizations for as long as the issue remains their focus. Even when all members of the community are accounted for, and an individual might conclude that the information has been conveyed and the broadcast could end, nonhuman primates continue to vocalize in the patterns associated with a particular danger or food. Tomasello, Origins of Human Communication, 54. Tomasello argues that most primate vocalizations are neither voluntary nor intentional (28).
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40 As Fitch notes, this argument is advanced by Charles Darwin in the second chapter of The Descent of Man. Fitch, The Evolution of Language, 470–74.
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42 Wray notes that in some cases young children who are forced to learn a new language by immersion are willing to “memorize and use strings [of words] before really understanding them.” Wray, Alison, “The Puzzle of Language Learning: From Child's Play to ‘Linguaphobia,’” Language Teaching 41, no. 2 (2008): 259CrossRefGoogle Scholar. This technique is especially effective for children around five years old who are outgoing and are thoroughly immersed in the new language. A study of slightly older children who were taught phrases but no grammar in a two-hours-per-week classroom setting (no immersion) showed a similar process, but a distinct lack of success. See also Fitzpatrick, Tess and Wray, Alison, “Breaking Up Is Not So Hard to Do: Individual Differences in L2 Memorization,” Canadian Modern Language Review 63, no. 1 (2006): 35–57 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
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44 Celia Deane-Drummond rightly cautions that in emphasizing characteristics that humans share with some animals “the special place of other creatures in their relationship with God both within their own worlds and in communion with humans may become compromised.” This can cause particular problems if we yield to the temptation to pay greater attention “to those creatures that are most like us.” Deane-Drummond, Celia, “In God's Image and Likeness: From Reason to Revelation in Humans and Other Animals,” in Questioning the Human: Towards a Theological Anthropology for the Twenty-First Century, ed. Boeve, Lieven, De Maeseneer, Yves, and Van Stichel, Ellen (New York: Fordham University Press, 2014), 61Google Scholar.
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59 Regarding the entrance chant, GIRM states that “the purpose of this chant is to open the celebration, foster the unity of those who have been gathered, introduce their thoughts to the mystery of the liturgical season or festivity, and accompany the procession of the priest and ministers.” “General Instruction of the Roman Missal,” 47.
60 This recognition and identity construction continues in the communion rite, the purpose of which “is to express the communicants’ union in spirit by means of the unity of their voices, to show joy of heart, and to highlight more clearly the ‘communitarian’ nature of the procession to receive Communion.” “General Instruction of the Roman Missal,” 86.
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72 Ibid.
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75 Rahner, Foundations of Christian Faith, 49.
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